


Getting Involved

by epersonae



Series: Aftermath [2]
Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Angus is Baby Magcretia, Awkward holidays, But most of them don't know it yet, Found Family, Gen, Implied Lucretia/Maureen, Post-Canon, Tumblr Prompts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-05
Updated: 2018-10-05
Packaged: 2019-07-25 14:43:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,441
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16199648
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/epersonae/pseuds/epersonae
Summary: Angus McDonald is getting ready for his first school break after the end of the world. There's two people he really wants to spend it with, but they're not talking to each other.





	Getting Involved

**Author's Note:**

> Tumblr prompt was "So much for not getting involved" with Lucretia and Taako; it took me a while to figure out what I wanted to do with it. Then I realized it needed to be a story that sort of prefaces Dinner and Conversation; something that gets into the quasi shared custody situation with Ango. Enjoy!

Angus is playing soccer, but his mind isn’t in it. The ball zips past him over the wet grass unheeded, then comes back the other way, Bobby kicking it towards the goal but it just bounces off of his head. Coach calls him off, asks if he’s okay, and he’s fine, but now he’s sitting on the sidelines with his thoughts even louder in his head.

The first ever term of the Miller School of Arcane Sciences is almost over. He’s learned a bunch, not just from Mr. Miller but from the other arcanists who’ve come out of the woodwork to be part of the school. From the other students, too: they’re all trying to figure out how to use the Millers’ secret research, to really understand it, to build on it. This is an exciting opportunity, and Angus is someone who’s had a lot of exciting opportunities.

But the term only goes for so long, and the other students and teachers are going to their families for Candlenights.

_ Family. _

Feels like a trick question, in a lot of ways. It’s not that he’s not loved, not when he has so many people showing up for soccer games, writing him letters, sending him cookies. He writes faithfully every week to Mister Taako, and to Madame Director, who insists he call her “Lucretia,” although he’s starting to suspect there’s another name he should use.

That’s the thing of it, isn’t it? Is he going to spend the holiday break with her, in his old quarters on the moon, or with him, in the house Mister Taako shares with his sister and Mister Bluejeans? He wants both, and also he wonders if he should skip both and go stay with Mister Magnus, who says that the house at Ravens’ Roost is “coming along real nice, always a place for you here.” He could do that; it would be easy, but is that what he wants?

He squints out at the soccer field, not really seeing the practice game coming to its conclusion, but instead considering the length of his break, wondering if he can make something work. He reaches over to his satchel and takes out his detective’s notebook and a pencil. 

//

Taako pretends not to read the kid’s letters, but it’s one-hundo percent a front: he pores over them, savoring every word, celebrating every little magical success. He sends back cookies decorated like wizard hats and soccer balls, because he’s so proud of the boy he could burst. He waves the letters at Lup and Barry and Kravitz to fond chuckles and (not always) gentle ribbing.

This one, though.

Agnes wants to visit for Candlenights, which: fuck yeah. Already he’s planning feasts and gifts and outings, figures the kid’ll enjoy hanging out with Barry  _ for sure,  _ pair of nerds like that, hopefully it won’t be awkward with Krav, and Lup already seems to like him….

But. Of course there’s a but. And of course it’s Creesh. “The Director gave me a home” blah blah blah, and even after  _ all that,  _ he still wants to spend time with  _ her  _ over Candlenights break too. Ango isn’t asking for Taako’s blessing, which: oh hell no. Just wants to keep him posted.

“Consider me posted, little dude,” Taako says to the empty room. What’s he gonna do about it, anyway? Ground him? Not like the kid’s his, not like he’s any of theirs, really, even if they all love him (and will he say so? never), he could pick anybody. Hell, no reason he couldn’t be writing to say  _ actually I’m spending the holidays at nerd school with nerdlord.  _ He ought to be grateful.

Well, McDangus ought to be grateful that Taako wants to spend  _ his _ Candlenights with the kid.

“So much for not getting involved,” he mutters as he takes out his stone of farspeech.

//

She smoothes the paper out on her desk: a single page of lined paper obviously torn from a notebook, with a tidy child’s handwriting in pencil. She puts her head in her hand and lets out a long sigh.

“So much for not getting involved,” she murmurs. She gave Angus up, chose to make no claim on him, except as his employer when he turned up all those years later. But she couldn’t help being fond of him. Couldn’t help getting attached, when he was so sincere and eager; she could feel her lies curdling on her tongue when she talked to him.

And since the Day, while she’s been in retreat, trying to figure out what comes next, and then as she went back out into the world to find a new place in it, he’s sent her letters. Lucas — who she thought was dead, thought she’d lost the way she lost Maureen — Lucas started a school, and somehow recruited  _ Angus? _ It was a shock at first, but as Angus wrote, she realized all the things she hadn’t seen in either of them. Something had changed in her stepson (maybe she can call him that out loud again someday) and something is changing in her son (maybe she can call him that to his face someday). She’s proud of them both, and with Angus at least she can tell him so.

He offers  _ her _ encouragement as well, his excitement about the library in Neverwinter palpable in his words; he has ideas for how to use her old networks to build a new organization, and she’s taking them seriously. Brad’s already back on the moon base getting the office set up again to get started.

This, though: she’s been ignoring the impending holiday season. Too many memories, too much to navigate. And into it, cutting through everything as if it wasn’t there: he wants to visit, if there’s room for him. There will always be room for him now, wherever she goes, but also: he wants to spend part of his break with Taako, too.

It’s not as though she didn’t see that bond forming. It’s not as though she didn’t  _ cherish _ it, from a safe distance. Seeing Taako open up, just a little, seeing him teach again, seeing him become a mentor to the boy, however snarky and secretive: it eased something in her heart. And seeing Angus turn towards that and respond to the intent while giving as good as he got...she smiled to think of it. Even after, when Taako turned away from her entirely, she was grateful for the relationship he continued with her son. (He doesn’t know; she’s afraid what will happen if he does.)

She would have been unsurprised if Angus had wanted to spend all of his break with Taako. (Lup and Barry too, and she misses them, though she's not sure if she's allowed to.) She would have been unsurprised if he'd chosen to split his break between Taako and Magnus. Instead she’s staring down a blank sheet of paper as she taps his letter with the end of her own pen.

//

All his clothes are packed in his suitcase, the one he bought after his old case disappeared into a pocket dimension along with an entire train. He checks one last time to make sure he has enough socks before placing neatly wrapped gifts on top. Copies of  _ Caleb Cleveland and the Case of the Missing Memories,  _ the newest addition to the series, enough for everyone, but also two special items.

For Madame Director, a small box of macarons; there isn’t much of a kitchen in the school dorms, but he’d commandeered what there was for an afternoon. Two ruined batches (sometimes he forgets the sugar; sometimes he forgets to take them out in time) but the third one came out just right. Soft and chewy and sweet; he’s visiting her first, so they won’t have time to go stale.

For Mister Taako, a bottle of ink; he’d spent most of a day in the markets of Neverwinter, and then he spotted a whole display of inks and brushes and pens. (He bought himself a new pen, too, and a plain practical inkwell.) The bottle is clear, the better to show off the purple with silver sparkles suspended and swirling inside of it. Maybe he’ll get a letter someday in that sprawling hand with that brilliant color.

He tucks the two boxes in between his sweater vests so they won’t be jostled and fastens the case before going outside. As he waits for a glass ball to land on the lawn in the central quad of the Miller School, he looks up at the moon, faint in the daylight, and he thinks of his new family — families? — and he smiles.


End file.
